Wednesday, January 23, 2013

retro-quotes: a series of germane remarks, by others, plucked from all over the place, and from all over the time - #38

“I consider it to be post-creation. We're all now just pulling and
pulling and pulling. Someone like Prince
was thinking of people in the past, but it didn't feel as funneled and as
specific. We're a bit derivative,
unfortunately, and it's not to our detriment always-- but we are direct
descendants and there are all these lineages. It's an interesting time for
music because people aren't trying to create anything brand new... Originality is not a thing anymore" -- Amanda Brown on the state of the art in music", May 2011 (interview with me for The Wire cover story on Not Not Fun)

versus

“I think the Simon Reynolds
perspective is the least modern attitude one could have toward art. And it’s a
little unfortunate that it’s infected so many people’s way of thinking. There’s
been almost no era when art hasn’t been hugely about the past – whether
reacting to it, recreating it, destroying it. Once in a while, a new piece of
actual music technology is invented and for the small window of time after that
there is a fresh, truly “new” style. But that’s not the norm, that’s the
fluke.... Rockabilly was retromania, Morrissey was retromania” --Amanda Brown, November 2011

^^^^^^"It's like, 'I've
just stumbled across a thing that nobody else has referenced yet'.... Everyone's
more inspired by a style, and the desire to be creative. It
doesn't mean there isn't emotion in the process.... But it does feel a little
divorced. That's why a lot of contemporary styles can have a sheen of irony,
because there's not a ton of people really fervently standing behind what they
do. There's no Fugazis anymore"-- Britt Brown, May 2011,(interview with me for The Wire cover story on Not Not Fun)

versus “I think reinterpreting old tropes (whether primitively, abstractly,
offensively, surreally) has always been a strategy of artists for moving
forward....Everything's always been referential, we just have more hyperlinks now"--- Britt Brown, date unknown.